Deloitte has joined IBM and Red Hat's Lightwell initiative as an integration collaborator, according to a joint press release from the three organizations. The collaboration aims to address vulnerabilities in open source software supply chains used by large enterprises.

Lightwell is designed to separate open source software security remediation from traditional software upgrade cycles. The initiative develops, tests, and backports patches directly to pinned software versions already running in production environments, allowing organizations to apply fixes without forcing system-wide upgrades.

Through the collaboration, the three organizations plan to offer clients four areas of coverage: continuous mapping and scanning of software components; prioritization of active threats based on severity and exploitability; automated patch validation and deployment; and compliance reporting for boards, auditors, and regulators.

Deloitte will contribute its cyber risk services and secured software supply chain architecture to the model. The firm also plans to maintain a team of Forward Deployed Engineers to support ongoing remediation and maintenance of client applications.

"Exploits don't wait for manual patching processes, and neither can enterprise response," said Adnan Amjad, Deloitte's US Cyber leader. "Together, we're enabling clients to operate at machine speed to identify, validate, and remediate vulnerabilities."

Savio Rodrigues, Vice President of Service Partners at IBM, said the initiative "brings together the engineering, automation, and ecosystem partnerships needed to tackle this risk at scale."

Kevin Kennedy, Vice President of Global Partner Ecosystem at Red Hat, said the work with Deloitte will bring remediation capabilities "directly to enterprise application environments."

The Lightwell collaboration builds on an existing relationship between Deloitte and IBM focused on cybersecurity and digital trust, as well as a decade-long alliance between Deloitte and Red Hat centered on open source technologies and IT automation.